The Tenth Winter: What You Get and How the Party Runs

The Tenth Winter is a murder mystery party game for 8 to 20 players from Cold Ledger Games, out tomorrow, Monday, October 19, on this site and on Etsy, as a printable and a digital edition on the same day. It costs $34.99 for either edition, or $27.99 in the Halloween sale from launch day through October 31. It runs about three hours, or 90 minutes when every player reads their character and the shared evidence ahead of time, and the host plays too.

Here is what comes in it and how the party runs, as the three choices a host makes: the edition, the length and the room. No spoilers: nothing here goes past the setup.

What Is the Story?

Ten winters ago, a young distillery threw its first year-end party at its founder's lake house, and after midnight its co-founder went through the ice of the frozen lake. The Tenth Winter is the tenth party: the same house, the same frozen lake. The Cold Ledger, a true-crime podcast, is halfway through a two-part episode about that winter, and its researcher has been phoning everyone who was at the first party. The founder has promised an announcement at the toast, and she never finishes it.

Printable or Digital?

Both editions come out together, at one price, and play the same game. The printable is a download: the host prints one sealed version and the shared evidence (US Letter, one-sided, black and white is fine), and each player reads their own character on a phone or on paper.

The digital edition is a room on everyone's phones, in one room or on a video call. The host starts it from a host page; players join with a link and a name, buy nothing and install nothing, and once cast, each phone shows its own character privately. On the full evening the host's phone runs it all: the toast, the sealed cards to the eight main characters' phones, the statements, the evidence waves, a secret vote the room counts, and the reveal on every screen at once. All of it ships Monday, detective teams included, and it plays like The Hundredth Episode's digital edition (the article on the digital editions has the details).

How Long Is the Party?

The full evening runs about three hours, arrival to verdict: guests arrive in character and work their objectives, the host reads the toast, every player reads a statement on the record, three waves of evidence follow at 25 to 30 minutes each, and the night ends on accusations, a secret vote and the solution card read aloud.

The 90-minute format plays the same mystery against a fixed end time by moving the reading out of the evening. Before the night, every player gets their own character guide and, separately, the shared evidence: one file, about half an hour's reading, identical across the four versions, so reading it early tells nobody who did it, the host included. On the night every player introduces a document, and all of the evidence is out by the thirty-one-minute mark: a puzzle race in costume, where the full evening is a party.

One Room, Two Tables or Teams?

One room is the default: one cast of 8 to 20. Characters 1 to 8 are required and the mystery can be solved with eight; characters 9 to 20 join in number order, and the roster accounts for every guest, played or not. No guide uses a pronoun for its character, so anyone can play anyone.

Two tables suit a group of 16 to 20 that would enjoy a race: two whole games at once, 8 to 10 players at each table, each with its own cast and its own blind pick of a different version. Both tables write their verdicts down before either reveal, then read them side by side.

Detective teams keep one cast and one killer and split the room into two or three teams. Everyone still plays their character, the killer is on somebody's team, and each team commits its verdict in writing before the reveal. Teams work at either length.

What Does the Host Do Beforehand?

The prep, beside the playing time:

In the digital edition there is nothing to print or sort: start the room ahead of time, send the link and cast players as they join. Saturday's article counts the calendar back from the party, and How to Host a Murder Mystery Party at Home walks through the same week with The Hundredth Episode.

What Is in the Printable?

The download holds:

• START HERE: for the host only: how the evening runs, the blind pick, and who may read what.
• The host materials: every line the host reads aloud, written out (the toast, the script that starts the round, hints for a stalled table, a short recap), the shorter format and the team modes; then the picker page and the four sealed versions.
• The character guides: all twenty, each with secrets, three objectives and a one-line costume, as a print pack and as twenty separate files so each player gets exactly one; the phone pack holds a casting sheet and the shared evidence too. Characters 9 to 20 read their statement for the record from their guide, and 1 to 8 from a sealed card.
• The evidence pack: the shared evidence for the three waves, the roster, the house plan, worksheets, name tags, voting cards, verdict cards for the team modes, the awards and two invitations.

Does the Host Play Too?

Yes. Four complete sealed versions come in the game, each with a different killer, and someone who isn't playing picks one (in the digital edition, the room picks and never says which). So the host can take a character and, unless their own sealed card says they did it, learn the answer at the reveal with everyone else, and the other three versions stay sealed for another night, with the same twenty characters and an evidence trail that convicts somebody else. Four Killers in One Box explains how the blind pick works; The Tenth Winter does it the same way.

Where Does the Story Start?

In a case file. The Tenth Winter can be played on its own, but if you will play both, play the case file first, because the party talks about that case. It is Accident, Drink Involved, the cold case for one or two that came out on Friday, printable or digital; Thursday's article covers what is in it.

What Happens After the Reveal?

Awards follow the reveal, win or lose, and one of them is for the best wrong theory. Guessing wrong is part of the evening, and there is a prize for doing it well.

Questions